As a child, Lise Nova Berwadushime longed to be a nurse, dentist, or medical laboratory assistant, which is why she opted for science in high school. When she applied for related university courses, she was assigned to biochemistry at the University of Rwanda’s College of Science and Technology where she completed the course and graduated in August this year. However, she says, she doesn’t see the need to apply for a job in that domain since her passion is writing. The 21-year-old writes stories, statements, poems, quotes, and even books. She currently works as a content writer for IT Simplified, an information technology company in Remera. To convey a few virtues like kindness, Berwadushime contemplated that in writing, she would drive her point home, recalling the help and kindness shown to her by strangers. “Topics that intrigue me are; healing, love, comfort, motivation, and so forth. I want to leave a mark on people’s lives that when they read my work, they feel the need to believe in themselves, and move past their dark past,” she says. Berwadushime notes that she is using her platform to ask people to practice compassion, humanity, love, and service. Inspiration Growing up seeing her mother write somehow drew her attention to it. Though she didn’t get any training, writing to her is something that she does effortlessly. In writing, she can disguise who she is and jot down what is on her mind, or a portion of her secrets, that way, she feels better. She started writing in 2015 when she was in senior five at ENDP Karubanda, a school that encourages talent development. “I wrote a story in a notebook and when my classmates read it, they started urging me to write more since they found it interesting. That’s when I said to myself, ‘You know what girl, you got this’, I never looked back,” the writer says. She started writing poems in Kinyarwanda and English, but is, however, more attracted to writing children’s stories. She says that kids are innocent and they believe almost everything you tell them, which is a good opportunity to teach them about love, compassion, patriotism, and more, that way, there is an assurance of the world being a better place. ‘Once they know how to do what is right, it’s hard to depart from it.’ The writer says she likes writing poems about womanhood and love (romance) most of the time. She feels intense love, passion, and pride as she writes something about women, their strength, divine nature, and fiery passion. For her, in brief, the writing journey has been and is still enjoyable. She has also taken the chance to learn from other writers. She considers writing as an opportunity to learn and grow. Berwadushime’s role model is anyone like her mother who fights and never trembles in the face of fear. She says such people inspire her to stand up for herself and go for what she wants, no matter the circumstances. In poetry and writing, she admires the late Cyprien Rugamba. He conveyed messages of love and humanity with great wisdom. The poet looks forward to building a career in writing. She is certain that one day in the future she will publish her work on her own website. Although she has written a collection of children’s stories titled “Gatete n’igisizimwe”, the writer notes that she still needs to learn and gather more knowledge so that when she publishes anything, the only reaction she gets is “wow”. Berwadushime joined a group known as ‘Writer space Africa-Rwanda’ where she is optimistic that her writing skills will be boosted. She has written more than 60 poems, some of these include, “Azagukunda Akunkundire”, “The prayer”, “Ni umukobwa”, “Coronation Day”, “Last Warning” and many more.
